bhl - a history

The Biodiversity Heritage LibraryOrigin | Growth | Partnerships

BHL Africa Launch | 15 April 2013Nancy E. Gwinn | Smithsonian Libraries

The cultivation of natural science cannot be efficiently carried on without reference to an extensive library

Charles Darwin, et al (1847)

Darwin, C. R. et al. 1847. Copy of Memorial to the First Lord of the Treasury [Lord John Russell], respecting the Management of the British Museum. Parliamentary Papers, Accounts and Papers 1847, paper number (268), volume XXXIV.253 (13 April): 1-3. [Complete Works of Charles Darwin Online]

Looking Forward

A large library

Yet another physical difficulty is the task of assembling the library and indexes which will enable the student to work under proper conditions…. the beginner must now be prepared to spend liberally, or else must establish himself in an institution where a large library exists; if he work by himself with only a few books, he will have to confine himself to a very narrow specialty indeed.

'The Limitations of Taxonomy' by J.M. Aldrich, Science, April 22, 1927, vol. LXV, no. 1686, p.381

Libraries & Laboratories2005, London

2003. Telluride. Encyclopedia of Life meeting

February 2005. London. Library and Laboratory: the Marriage of Research, Data and Taxonomic Literature

May 2005. Washington. Ground work for the Biodiversity Heritage Library

June 2006. Washington. Organizational and Technical meeting

October 2006. St. Louis/San Francisco. Technical meetings

February 2007. Museum of Comparative Zoology. Organizational meeting

May 2007. Encyclopedia of Life and BHL Portal Launch. Washington DC.

February 2008. Launch of EOL species pages and associated BHL literature

BHL Timeline

INTERNET ARCHIVE HEADQUARTERSSAN FRANCISCO, CA

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BHL Formed in 2006....Now 15 Member Institutions

15 Members•Academy of Natural Sciences Library and Archives•American Museum of Natural History Library•California Academy of Sciences Library•Cornell University Library•The Field Museum Library•Harvard University Botany Libraries•Ernst Mayr Library of the Museum of Comparative Zoology•Library of Congress•Marine Biological Laboratory and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution Library•Missouri Botanical Garden Library•Natural History Museum, London, Library & Archives •The New York Botanical Garden•Royal Botanic Garden, Kew, Library & Archives•Smithsonian Institution Libraries•United States Geological Survey Libraries

BHL US | UK

How is BHL Organized?Executive Committee - Chair, Vice-Chair, Secretary - Project Director & Program Manager - Technical Director

Steering Committee - Institutions who contribute member dues annually - Officers elected from this group Institutional Council - All Steering Committee members - Other groups who are committed to purpose

BHL Executive Committee, 2011-Nancy Gwinn | Connie Rinaldo | Susan Fraser

Secretariat and Technical StaffAugust 2011Program Director

Program ManagerCollections Coordinator

Technical DirectorProgrammerData Analyst

BHL Member Participation Staff FTE

16.22 FTE from the 14member institutions(does not include Secretariat or Technical staff)

Funding BHL US|UK- Private Grants- US Federal Appropriations- Membership dues- Institutional support

Accomplishments

40,381,261pages111,715 items58,495 titles

5 March 2013

Content Growth2007-2013

3.8 million total views | 63,000 images (13 Feb 13)

BHL & EOL BoothAmerican Library Association MeetingDallas, TX, January 2012

Meetings

BHL US-UKAnnual Meetings - Face to Face - Steering Committee - Institutional Council - Global BHL - Technical Group

Telephone Conferences - Executive Committee - weekly - Steering Committee - monthly - Global BHL - as needed

Inventing as we go. . .

BHL US-UK GovernanceMemoranda of UnderstandingBylawsMeetingsConstant Communication (email, telephone, social media, blog, etc.)

Life and Literature Conference and JRS

Africa meetings Chicago, IllinoisNovember 2011

June 2012

Over 30 librarians, scientists, informaticians gathered in Cape Town, South Africa to start the formation of the BHL Africa node; funded by JRS Foundation

SomeStatistics

User Statistics: 2007 - 2012Visitors: 3,628,088Page Views: 17,604,395New vs. Returning: 48.88% vs. 50.12%

2007

2012112,584 visitors | March 2012

~1.6 m users | 16 m page views

233 countries

Macaw (Metadata Collection and Workflow). Scanning workflow and ingest management tool. Based on “Paginator” (MOBOT), Macaw allows for creating robust page level metadata and pushing content to other repositories (e.g. Internet Archive and local storage) .

Social MediaSocial Media

“Thank you much for your help. It is so useful as I am right now working on the fishes of Ganges. Moreover it is so great that the library provides classic literature on fishes and it was a dream to me [when] I started my taxonomy ten years back. It is marvellous [what] you did for us which are badly in need of old literature. Thanks a lot.”“Thank you much for your help. It is so useful as I am right now working on the fishes of Ganges. Moreover it is so great that the library provides classic literature on fishes and it was a dream to me [when] I started my taxonomy ten years back. It is marvellous [what] you did for us which are badly in need of old literature. Thanks a lot.”

What an absolutely wonderful site. It is a treasure trove of information. Thank you!

May I compliment you on this splendid service? The Library's invaluable for my work on seasonal variability

of climate and vector-borne disease in British India, 1875-1940.

I really appreciate your work. The Biodiversity Heritage Library is an excellent resource that regularly helps my assistant and I obtain original descriptions for plants .... I feel so privileged to be working in a day in age when such resources are so readily available and easy to obtain.

Thanks toMartin Kalfatovic

CongratulationsBHL Africa!